Saturday, March 31, 2012

I had lunch with another Jo on Friday. A Jo who I have been friends with for over 30 years. We met when we worked together at Red Rooster. Since then our lives have taken similar and different turns...husbands, kids, homes and work. So now we keep in touch via texts and see each other occasionally. Yesterday we hadn't had a face to face catch up for about 18 months and during a long lunch we talked and talked and got up to speed. It has always been that way, we can have long intervals between visits but it's as if no time has passed by at all.

I have met and worked with a lot of Jos in my time. It seems to be a very common name, shortened from quite a few other longer names. When I was a teenager Jos' step children called me JoJo. Shortening Jo-Anne to JoJo is a very intimate gesture to me, and very few do it. Nearly every one calls me Jo except now for a few family members and it depends on my mood if I introduce myself as Jo or Jo-Anne. Some people assume because my name is hyphenated that my name is Jo with a middle name of Anne. Most people go ahead and shorten it anyway. I have a couple of (older) patients who insist on calling me Jo-Anne even though I am always Jo at work. My mother hated the shortened form for me or any of her offspring and Australians cant leave a name alone, its always shortened or lengthened or changed altogether! My mother told me that she wanted to name me Babette but my father baulked at that idea and my name was a compromise from his offering of Joanna.

I'm pretty interchangable on the whole thing and dont mind either way. I do get tired of having spell out the hyphen and have registrations with companies reward programs in a few different configurations. That gets a bit tricky if you dont have their card on you and they look for it in their data bases.

Maybe I should just be Jo in that case, it's a bit hard to misspell that but anything is possible eh?

Saturday, March 24, 2012

My extra quiet one is away this weekend. He had an opportunity to fly to Qld with some mates to celebrate the year of turning 21. This is just the first of the 21st's. But for my quiet son who doesn't normally venture very far without us this has been the biggest solo adventure so far. He is quite naive compared to Hayley, who can nut out pretty much any situation, and there has been a few texts with questions that seem obvious to us but have presented challenges for him.

It will be a good experience for him, to manage a small amount of money and make it last, to get himself from place to place without getting lost and to be responsible.

Sunday, March 18, 2012

Tony was suffering from renal failure and Pam donated her kidney to put an end to dialysis. Just 10 days ago. It has all gone really well and they are both home and doing well. Not only is Pam a colleague, she & Tony are the parents of the boy who lives next door (small town!).

Tony should be back at work soon and back volunteering with the CFA, his new kidney working a treat. They are very thankful to the medical team that looked after them both and we are grateful to have them back on deck.

Saturday, March 17, 2012

My race bib and singlet came for the 'Run 4 the kids' race in just 15 days. My training has been less than ideal but I did get a swim in on Friday. I have good and bad runs this last week. The next 2 weeks I will amp up the running in preparation.

there are other plusses and very few minuses. As Lisa Fitzpatrick said the only disappointment was the length of time it took to come to a conclusion.

I went along to the meeting and got caught up in 'red fever'. The red shirt campaign was a stroke of genius, it unified the troops and made it very identifiable. We knew we always had the support of the community, it was just the government who tried to break our resolve. We were lucky out at the Marsh we were not asked to walk out at any stage, we did close some beds but no-one had to have their pay docked and for much of the ugly part of the campaign I was on leave. So its over and we will all benefit.

Thursday, March 15, 2012

Today there are a few more bald heads than there were yesterday. A few more people feeling the wind whistling around their ears. Our colleague is one of those people, by shaving and fundraising for the Leukaemia Foundation.

We all got into the swing of it, Mandy wielded the clippers

The Urgent Care cheeer squad entertained us

Deb even has the sort of head that looks really good with a number 1 buzz cut

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

I was just reading Amy's post about her crooked glasses and it made me chuckle. Not that needing to wear glasses is funny but it reminded of recent events.

Firstly after my op I must have bent my glasses too. I need them to read. I read for about 4 hours lying on a trolley waiting to go in. I didn't read again until I was at home recuperating but since then the glasses dont sit straight and it's a bit disconcerting.

Secondly, while I was out with Big Sister at the Caravan & Camping Show, I wanted to read something and she whipped out her glasses for me to use. Her glasses are also a bit wonky, and not the strength I need, and the lens fell out. This apparently is a common occurrence and she was prepared with a tiny screwdriver to repair them on the spot. Except the spot she chose to use was covered in a perforated matting and the tiny screw holding the whole thing together pinged off never to be seen again. But foolishly we thought between the pair of us, with our dodgy non assisted vision, that we would find that screw. We didn't.

Losing focus is no fun.

Another disconcerting thing happened today.

I have been waiting for a letter from our niece. I might have mentioned that once or..twenty times. So today I received something I was not expecting at all. Instead of the aforementioned missive, that has I've been told has been posted, I got a licence renewal licence for...our mother. Our mother has been dead for 7 years and this must be one thing we forgot about or overlooked or didn't even think about. Our address was put on it because of her car & I remember the day we went in together for that last renewal. I even made a cheeky comment about needing a 10 year renewal back then. She would have been 82 this year but if she had been in good health she would have still been driving, she loved her car and to drive.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Erin is back in the fold. She spent many hours on the bus & headed straight to the pantry & the shower. These are the things you crave when you are not in your own environment. She had a really good time in Canberra, loved the War Memorial, Questacon & the National Museum but thought that Parliament House was unnecessarily fancy.

They stopped at Holbrook to have a break. We have fond memories of that little town. It is a popular spot to have a break being midway between Melbourne and Sydney/Canberra. Holbrooks claim to fame is a very large submarine parked in a reserve. And it became a very large bonus in a family travel game.

When we journeyed as a family to Sydney and beyond, we devised this game to occupy the many hours we spent in the car. Basically it is a spotting game where you earn points for every item you spot. Cows and sheep are worth 1 point as they are very common. A caravan on the road is worth 10 points and if that van had bikes or a boat attached was worth double points. A camel was worth 50 points (although we did not see such an animal we did have to pay Erin spotting a 'Thirsty Camel' bottle shop on one of our trips). Road kill was worth 10 points, hitchhikers 100 (we have never got any points for hitch hikers, none to be seen on our routes), an abandoned trolley also 100 points (they are rarer than you would first think). Points were also awarded for trains and kudos if you saw the ocean first. The driver often got the most points as they spend the most time awake. Chris wanted to know how many points for a tank and then the submarine we never imagined we would see in our travels.
Even now when it is just Erin & I travelling the game goes on. I will have forgotten about it and she will call out 'caravan' and it begins again. We have long forgotten to keep score. I still chuckle to myself about the submarine.

While Erin has been away I bought a tent for ourselves, celebrated my nieces birthday on her exeat, ventured out for my first run having waited out my 2 & half week enforced hiatus and scrapped a few more pages.

Friday, March 9, 2012

Some things are not well advertised or I'm not paying attention. Yes I'd heard lots about Joseph Kony but nothing about it being International Womens Day. The 'International' moniker suggests that it was a world wide event. I only knew about it when my lovely daughter texted me to wish me a happy one with an addition about how much she admires me. I was really touched and responded with how proud she makes me and what a lovely woman she is turning into.

When I went to the website I found lots of information including this graph. No surprise Australia has the lowest bar for events.

Fittingly though I spent the day doing something I wanted to and spent the day with my sister, another spectacular woman. Otherwise it was a day spent mothering 2 of our 3 children plus one girlfriend. Erin is in Canberra and is apparently incommunicado.

Monday, March 5, 2012

I watched 'Hereafter', verdict - pretty good. 'Whats your number?', verdict - pretty good and Chris Evans is very easy on the eye. I also watched 'Crazy, Stupid love', verdict - pretty good and Ryan Gosling is also easy on the eye.

My books are keeping me up at night, novels by Harlen Coben and Dianne Blacklock proving to be real page turners. Meanwhile the ironing basket is full and my battle with the caterpillars on the grapevine is a losing one.

The rain has finally stopped, the sun even came out yesterday and it was quite warm, today cool again. My heart goes out to those in the north of the state who are inundated with muddy water & are hoping for no more rain. We had about 50mls all up and no flooding.

The boy racer...partner, friend, good guy

Hayley, the first one

Hayleys blog @ Tumblr

Callum, the quiet one

Erin, the sweet one

About Me

I'm a wife & busy mother. I love scrapping, cooking, photography & being with family. I still agonise over my children even though they have reached adolescence & adulthood.
And in 2011 I became a runner!